Prelude

"So this is the prize; a child?"

In the righteous house of worship, where polychromatic glints fell upon the feet of a crucifix setting a sunglow hue over the furrowed mass of pages scripting gospels, a child knelt amidst the gathering. The mosaic glass' pale twilight illuminated a mundane man who barely stood upright, casting a shadow over the pubescent who refrained from crossing his glare.

The sacred house felt with the presence of believers each sat at the middle edges of pew chairs; another associate of people in brown robes stood round between the outer edges and walls. This was much of an irregular gathering of two parties whose beliefs and customs contrasted from one another.

"He's done it again!" Slurred the priest. "The world has sinned a plenty but his mercy shall once again purify the impure. And in her sacrifice humanity shall find another millennium to respire."

"I think not." Imposed the other chap.

"Great heavens! Such impudence."

The priest threw about his hands swaying the pendulous vestment which gave him character. He was an old man of over seventy years whose questionable wisdom was represented by each strand of white dangling over the sides of a bald head. Old man felt that the other man being so prosaic was an intermediate trait of his. Here the prayful folk should at once place a hand over his head and tell a prophecy supposedly to cure him of his frame of mind.

"Bow down, bloke. Can't you see? This is the closest thing to the truth. As a matter of fact, she is the goddess of the new world."

"I dare not wager my innocence on this. For I only follow our Lord the all father, when my judgement comes I shall dwell the heavens forever."

"Since you are so convinced of your fate, why not hasten your descent to hell." A pistol's barrel met the priests eyes and in them spelt regret.

"He shall never, forsaken me."

"You have my blessings... Be seeing you." And just like that, by the next second the poor priest dropped to the floor with a thud. Eyes wide open but lifeless and his chest covered in stains that soaked his vestment in red.

Addressing the elephant in the room: the child who was still kneeling aside the man, gave no reaction as though she were deaf and blind. Despite her adolescent appearance, the girls composure surpassed that of anyone else occupying the place. In her elegance she resembled an heiress descendant to Welsh. Light golden hair drooped over her petite body and was as rich as it would look by a mother's touch.

"Meredith..." The man gently spoke. "Is that your name child?"

She did not reply, however.

Instead, the girl had a distant look in her eye revealed beneath the sweeps of blonde. In their focus they motioned an action of vibrant yellow in the display of sand painting. The first image began with what seemed to be a fire in a space balanced against its own light. Soon after the flame burnt out slowly and in its reduction a droplet formed, cutting off from the flame's base and falling onto the ground with an ambient that resonated across the room.

Strangely, when the droplet met the tile floor, an effect of motion waves created and expanded a dream-like atmosphere and the recoil of amber dust retracted back to the centre of impact, shot up and formed an irregular object. Startled, the man who was then absorbed into the essence of illusion, is drawn into a field in the plains where a sudden war happens behind him. There, men slaughtered men, inferno hailed from the ember skies showering all that ran, walked, crawled and slid.

Terrified by the mirage, the man held onto his head keeping his sanity from escape. Little old girl stepped in front of him and pointed right past his elbow to when he turned around a boy stood far out in the distance. Pasted against the horizon over the solid ground which had been terreformed to nothing but men and his weapon, victory and her loss, the sharply outlined young man of about fifteen years old pointed back to the girl. After a near mindless attempt to decipher the meaning of what he just witnessed, the man lowered his body even below his poor posture and with trembling hands he proceeded to touch the girl's face. He could hear a voice that called out his name - at first in different but distorting voices. All the fella did was try to feel reality.

"...Nine? Oi, Nine!" It was Brandon who's presence broke the trance completely so now that amber dust was recollecting back to what it started as. A sand storm, wave motion, reversing droplet, a growing flame and then the child's discerning blank stare.

"Ai, brother, you're - did, you see that?"

"What. Have you seen a ghost?" Brandon's eyes darted to the lifeless priest, the pool of red he laid on. "That's what happens when you take away the lives of those one with the holy. Worst of all, you committed this act in the house of their Lord, not to mention the kid..." He winced at the smell of fresh blood.

"I'm sorry."

"Nine, I want you to hold on to that grief. He was a liar after all and I understand you hate those who tell the untruth. That sorrow will be useful when you finally take mine."

"Ridiculous." Nine chuckled but his word got immediately by Brandon's straight face. The chuckle faded to gasps. "What is that supposed to mean?"

Brandon says nothing, leaving his unrelated brother to whom they both referred to each other as blood, to ponder alone. He approaches the child almost in a swagger and stopped in front of her. After one longitudinal stare, he turns away to face everybody else.

"Improbable." He began. "What does it say exactly? What events will mark its phase of reckoning?"

From the party in robes one stepped forward and replies:"Slowly but surely, the world will see its day come and there isn't much time."

"I'm past the end of my wits. What the hell are you saying?"

"We must pay gratitude to the lords. This is to say we honour a sacrifice."

From his navy coat Brandon pulls out a pistol before decisively pointing at the elephant in the room. Expecting somewhat of a reaction out of her, he was stunned to notice nothing. He inched closer to the trigger and squinted an eye only for a vein to bulge out his forehead. Repulsed by the unprecedented act, Nine pushes that hand down as he spoke to him, "Not here, not now." in a low tone he stood by his words.

A grunt came from Brandon irritated by the inordinate reaction. He again swaggered toward the pew seats then sat himself down into comfort, widening the gap between his legs as he does. "I'm listening..."

"Our lives are marked by a persistent struggle with sin, making it unlikely for our deeds to receive redemption through grace alone. This is why the sacred decade of cleansing became a custom, numbered days of judgement to restore and forgive our imperfect spirits." The two brothers looked at each other as the person continued. "And she may be the embodiment of fate and goodness all at once. The chosen one, the begotten one, whose destiny is to bear the weight of our burdens upon her shoulders..." The person took a step back into the line of robed figures. Brandon's other arm was hung over the part of the bench supporting his back. As he glanced secretly at his brother and the child, he couldn't help but come to the realisation of he was the only one who did not grasp anything during this lesson. He could have sworn that he heard a heavy sigh elsewhere and from another corner a rise of delight.

"Did it mention any way to prevent this? And how sure are you that this isn't some big... lie?" He then stole another glance of Nine, careful not to intend direction with the question.

"Omens never lie ai," Replies Nine, turning his back to him in a gesture of dismissing more questions. "it's sealed... Nothing can be done to subvert imminent fatality. The vision, however, did hint the existence of another exception."

"Vision?" Brandon hastily asked, earning another unembodied sigh.

"Take it a revelation because I may know his origin to be... I may owe history to the Feustins."

* * *

"Are you out of your mind?"

Nine's back was pushed against the wall as Brandon forced his grip on Nine's collar. Brandon was seething so much so you could feel the steam escape between his teeth. "Depends: being in quite a hellhole of a job; not knowing just how we got ourselves in such a predicament in the first place. Which one?" He replied as his grip loosened but kept shaking.

"The second one," Nine gently said encouraging his brother to follow the calmed breathing. Slowly, he let their eyes meet, speaking some strange comfort in one sympathetic stare. Finally like complying with the simple gesture, Brandon let go and dusted Nine by the shoulders after gently pulling down at his clothing setting it neat again.

The passage they stood in was lit up by two lanterns hung by the side of either wall. Brandon opened the one to his left and reached closer to the exposed flame. Within a moment his cigar caught on. Then he inclined forward to pull and blow at it, coaxing it to stay alight.

When he was satisfied he closed the casing and ashed the cigar as he tapped it on the wall.

Down the short passage was a wide oak door leading to the nave where everyone else gathered. "I say it's the second one that is driving you insane because your entire home hangs in balance. For some reason how it may all go down is put in your responsibility. Sure ai, tis too much to bear, but are you gonna risk it whether you understand this or not? Or are you just gonna let it past your guard."

"No. You know what I think it's both." Shrilled Brandon. "Climbing to this position was a struggle on its own. Like that wasn't enough I'm suddenly greeted by the end of the world type o' shit. But tell me, the rules that that prophecy speaks, how much of it are you certain of?"

"Bran... you're sweating..."

When he stopped to listen to Nine he caught his fingers trembling. From the surprise and paranoia he didn't understand he began to choke on his own air.

"Tis why I stick to cheap stuff." He spat the cigar to the ground and shuffled his boot over it to extinguish its sparks, grunting and coughing in the process. It was an excuse but enough to ignore something.

"Bran... are you, scared?"

Almost instantly, the person getting the question was taken aback. He brought himself back to the

moment by sighing, almost not realising that he'd gone silent for half a minute. When he replied an unclear answer to whether or not he was scared, Nine shot another question his way. "Hang on, do you know someone who goes by the second name Feustin?"

"Not sure." He hastily replied. " I mean, no, no I don't know anyone whom has that surname. I was just concerned another unassuming soul would be endangered by the so-called omen. Worried that some woman will have to bear the price of our fates combined... It's nothing, really."

"Who said it is a woman?"

"Uh well-"

Suddenly, the doors creaked open and a young man looking thirty years of age all because fear wrinkled up his face peered through before excusing himself. "S-sorry mister, they were asking for you both over here." Said he. His message unto the two was rejected by their hands waving him to move forward. The fella was very hesitant in approaching Nine and Brandon like they'd drop him to his grave the same way Nine did to that poor priest and both not give a care in a lifetime how he coldly lay on the floor, dead.

When the young man found the courage to sprint out the exit, Nine turned to the pal and says: "It'll be okay, Bran." He placed his hand on his shoulder and kept his stare between looking into his eyes and at the floor. "By order of the heavens and Earth, I just know it."